Scars of her Blood • Shadowhunters

Chapter 10: Lydia Branwell

Celia joined Alec and Izzy at the railing, when Clary moved away from Jace and Celia could get a closer look at her – or rather at what she was holding.

"Are you okay?", asked Izzy. But Celia just nodded. The Mortal Cup had something strangely appealing to it. The more Celia thought about the reason for that, the less sense it made. It's probably just my demonic traits being weird... She flinched a little when Izzy lashed out with her whip and got a hold of the Cup.

"There's nothing a Shadowhunter can't do in heels.", she said in a satisfied tone. Celia blinked. What were they talking about? She followed Izzy down the stairs to join Clary and Jace in the command center. Alec walked past them to go stare blankly at one of the screens, while Izzy handed Clary the Cup for her to put it back into the card she had pulled it from. Celia was still suspicious of this power of Clary's. She had never heard of it before, and it made no sense to her why Clary possessed it.

"Alec, stop staring at the screen.", said Jace, "you know that no Downworlder can enter the Institute."

"Well, last time I checked, Valentine is a Shadowhunter.", Alec turned around to them with a grim expression on his face, "the Cup isn't safe here. We have to give it to the Clave."

Clary shook her head:

"Give it to the Clave?! No way – not after everything we went through to get it.", she looked like Alec had proposed to kill Simon.

"Alec is right.", Celia and Izzy said in unison, only that Celia's tone was a lot sharper, "the Cup has to be someplace safe, and that is definitely not in your hands!"

"But the Cup is the only chance I have to getting my Mum back!", Clary threw in. Once again, she sounded like she was close to crying.

Celia rolled her eyes:

"It's also the one chance Valentine has to rule the world."

Jace stepped in:

"Look, I agree with Clary. We need the Cup for now, but we can give it to the Clave later."

Clary nodded:

"I know how powerful the Cup is. It can control demons, can create new Shadowhunters and kill a Mundane if they would drink from it. But I promise you, I will not let Valentine get his hands on it!"

"Great, you can recite a history book...", Celia was not far from simply snatching the card out of Clary's hand. The only thing that was holding her back for now was the hope to reach some sort of compromise.

"She just gave us her word, Celia!", Jace interrupted her.

"And what does that help, if the Circle goes after her and simply takes it? She can't defend herself, let alone one of the most important objects in the Shadowworld!"

Alec sighed:

"Fine... Come with me...", he turned around and headed for the training room. Celia knew what he was about to do and lunged forward, grabbing the card from Clary's hand before she could follow Alec:

"Nu-uh! If we are keeping this thing, then not in one of your ridiculously impractical floor safes!"

Celia turned around and made her way to her office. Behind her, she heard Jace complain and then Alec's voice cutting through his:

"Her option is safer..."

When Celia reached her office, she closed the door behind her firmly and walked over to the cupboard on the opposite side of the room. There was one door in this unit that had a safe behind it. Celia opened it and stretched out her right arm. A tiny laser scanned over her wrist, recognizing the tattoo with her families' coat of arms. A quiet clicking sound indicated that the safe that was placed under the laser was open now. Celia put the card inside, completely ignoring the other item in the safe and closed it up again. At least that's one less thing to worry about... Celia had barely finished her thought, when her phone vibrated in her pocket: Come into the basement, storage room on the left! NOW The text had come from Izzy and the simple intensity of the capital letters was enough to set off a slight headache for Celia.